Luke Hunter is the President and Chief Conservation Officer of Panthera. Before joining Panthera, Hunter worked for the Wildlife Conservation Society as the head of their Great Cats Program and he taught wildlife ecology at universities in Australia and South Africa. He has worked on the ecology and conservation of carnivores for more than two decades, starting with his doctoral and post-doctoral work on re-establishing populations of lions and cheetahs in areas where they had been wiped out by people in South Africa. That research helped develop protocols which now act as the standard for large cat restoration, and have resulted in over 45 new populations of wild lions across Southern Africa.

At Panthera, he oversees the planning and execution of the organization’s field programs around the globe, and supervises the scientific priorities of Panthera’s work. He is especially focused on developing and scaling up solutions to widespread retaliatory killing of big cats by rural communities, and on improving the protection of wild cat habitat. He also works on reducing the impacts of legal recreational hunting on leopard and lion populations in Africa; in the Brazilian Pantanal to reduce the conflict between ranchers and jaguars; and in Iran on Persian leopards and the last surviving Asiatic cheetahs. Hunter supervises graduate students working on wild cats around the world, focusing especially on initiating comprehensive studies on very poorly studied species such as African golden cats and Sunda clouded leopards.

Luke Hunter has written extensively about wild cats and their conservation, publishing widely in both scientific journals and popular media, including for Slate, The Huffington Post and National Geographic. He has published seven books including Cheetah (2003), Cats of Africa: Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation (2006) and Field Guide to Carnivores of the World (2011), which has been translated into Chinese, French and German editions. His most recent book, Wild Cats of the World, was released in 2015.

"I think the naysayers who think [conserving cats] doesn’t matter because it’s too late are really missing the point. It just isn’t too late. In many of these species we are facing a real crisis and a real challenge, but we can succeed. I think if we stop today it would be too late. The point is we’re not going to…"

Dr. Luke Hunter, President & Chief Conservation Officer, Panthera

Dr. Luke Hunter was featured in the CBS 60 Minutes program, ‘In Search of the Jaguar,’ filmed through Panthera’s Pantanal Jaguar Project.

Popular Articles Featuring Dr. Hunter

External

Popular Article

2018-03-12 13:18:51

Leopards On The Verge Of Extinction In Cambodia

Source: NPR Here and Now

External

Popular Article

2018-01-31 13:21:54

WATCH: Lions Ambush an Elephant Calf, Buffalo Cavalry Charges in

Source: Earth Touch News Network

External

Popular Article

2017-11-28 02:00:00

Trump’s Indecision on Trophy Hunting Reignites Heated Debate

Source: Mongabay

External

Popular Article

2017-11-26 02:00:00

Sick Trade in Lions Taken from their Mothers, Reared by Humans and Shot by 'Hunters' in Tiny Enclosures Before Having Bones Sold as Trinkets

Source: NZ Herald

External

Popular Article

2017-07-27 13:39:15

Readers Sound Off: Outrage Over Lions’ Death is Not Enough

Source: USA Today

External

Popular Article

2017-07-21 01:00:00

Death of Cecil's Cub Xanda 'A Devastating Loss': Conservationist

Source: News 24

External

Popular Article

2017-07-20 19:07:08

Cecil the Lion’s Son Has ‘Met the Same Fate’ — Killed in a Trophy Hunt in Zimbabwe

Source: The Washington Post

External

Popular Article

2017-07-20 16:33:01

Trophy Hunter Kills Cecil The Lion’s Son Outside National Park

Source: Huffington Post

External

Popular Article

2017-07-20 16:28:33

Xanda Killed (Part 2)

Source: CBC Radio

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 17:28:49

Animal First: Wild Lioness Photographed Nursing Leopard Cub

Source: Reuters

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 01:00:00

Incredible Photos of a Lioness Nursing a Leopard Cub Shows Never-before Seen Encounter

Source: USA Today

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 01:00:00

'Truly Unique' Mother Lioness Nurses Leopard Cub in Tanzania

Source: BBC

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 01:00:00

'Truly Unique': Lioness Adopts and Nurses Leopard Cub

Source: The Guardian

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 01:00:00

'Unique:' Lion Seen Nursing Leopard Cub in Tanzania

Source: Associated Press

External

Popular Article

2017-07-14 01:00:00

Incredible Photos of a Lioness Nursing a Leopard Cub Shows Never-before Seen Encounter

Source: USA Today

External

Popular Article

2017-07-13 19:52:30

'Truly Unique:' Lion Seen Nursing Baby Leopard For The First Time

Source: TIME

External

Popular Article

2017-07-13 18:19:14

First-Ever Photos Show Wild Lion Nursing Leopard Cub

Source: National Geographic

External

Popular Article

2017-07-13 18:10:23

For the First Time, a Wild Lioness is Photographed Nursing a Baby Leopard

Source: The Washington Post

External

Popular Article

2017-07-13 14:52:01

Photos: Wild Lion Adopts Leopard Cub, an Unprecedented Sight

Source: Newsweek

External

Popular Article

2017-07-02 10:44:28

Camera Traps Are Now Watching Poachers, Instead of Wildlife

Source: Vice

External

Popular Article

2017-06-17 13:17:24

How to Save the Jaguars? Turn the Locals From Foe to Friend

Source: National Geographic

External

Popular Article

2017-06-07 18:39:12

Two Lions Rescued from a Circus Suffer ‘an Absolute Tragedy’ a Year Later

Source: The Washington Post

External

Popular Article

2017-05-30 11:14:33

South Africa’s ‘Lion Whisperer’ Gets Up Close with Big Cats

Source: Associated Press

External

Popular Article

2017-05-17 13:42:04

The Extinction Crisis is Here. How do We Keep from Feeling Overwhelmed?

Source: The Revelator

External

Popular Article

2017-04-10 14:09:30

National Geographic Photo Ark Spotlight: Ocelot

Source: National Geographic

External

Popular Article

2017-04-06 17:52:08

Poaching Isn’t the Cheetah’s Only Problem

Source: Smithsonian

External

Popular Article

2017-03-31 11:54:12

Ligers, Tigons and Liligers: All You Need to Know About Big Cat Hybrids and Why Breeding Them Isn't a Great Idea

Slotow, R. and L.T.B. Hunter. 2009. Reintroduction decisions taken at the incorrect social scale devalue their conservation contribution: the African lion in South Africa. In Hayward, M and Somers, M...

Slotow, R. and L.T.B. Hunter. 2009. Reintroduction decisions taken at the incorrect social scale devalue their conservation contribution: the African lion in South Africa. In Hayward, M and Somers, M...

Setting Conservation and Research Priorities for Larger African Carnivores.

Source: Wildlife Conservation Society

Download

Scientific Publications

2003-12-01 02:00:00

Mortality in a protected leopard population, Phinda Private Game Reserve: A population in decline?

Download

Scientific Publications

1999-12-31 21:00:00

Hunter, L. T. B. and R. Slotow. 2000. The socio-ecology of re-introduced lions in small reserves: comparisons with established populations and the implications for management in enclosed conservation...

Hunter, L. T. B. and R. Slotow. 2000. The socio-ecology of re-introduced lions in small reserves: comparisons with established populations and the implications for management in enclosed conservation...

Download

Scientific Publications

1998-12-01 02:00:00

Large Felid Restoration: Lessons from the Phinda Resource Reserve, South Africa, 1992-1999

Download

Scientific Publications

1998-09-30 21:00:00

Hunter, L.T.B. 1998. Early post-release movements and behavior of reintroduced cheetahs and lions, and technical considerations in large carnivore restoration. University of Pretoria.10:72-82.

Hunter, L.T.B. 1998. Early post-release movements and behavior of reintroduced cheetahs and lions, and technical considerations in large carnivore restoration. University of Pretoria.10:72-82.